June 30, 2012

After over a year of play testing not just the Cold Stream campaign on the PC but the entire DLC consisting of Blood Harvest, Crash Course, Cold Stream, Dead Air, and Death Toll, we are ready to release on the Xbox 360.

The date will be July 24th. There are some other surprises and details we will give you later but for now we just want to confirm an often requested feature. With the update going out at the same time (also for the PC), all of the mutations will be available at all times.

March 16, 2012

Now that we have a solid version of the maps (some minor changes still coming), we are focused on the DLC and getting some pesky bugs out of the shipping version. As soon as we have a release date we will let you know.

January 7, 2012

With the team back from the holidays, we have been hard at work on the Cold Stream DLC and wanted to let you know what is going on.

Right now the focus is on making sure the game plays well on the Xbox 360. We still have a few problems spots that we are working on before we begin heavy internal testing and then release to certification. Sorry, we don’t have a release date yet.

Before the holidays, we made a push on outstanding bugs and issues in all the campaigns in the DLC. One of the ongoing bugs has been an item density issue caused by the differences between how Left 4 Dead 1 and 2 handle density.

We looked into a few different ways to handle it. To fix it right, we needed to fix it in each campaign map by map. While we were updating each map, we fixed other bugs and exploits in those maps.

Starting next week we will be releasing these updates a campaign or two at a time to get more feedback from the community. Your playing, posting, and general feedback has made this whole process a much better game for everyone – thanks!

Next week we will start by releasing an updated version of Crash Course and Cold Stream. The other campaigns will follow. While the release notes are lengthy, we can give you some idea of the extent of the updates.

For Crash Course: The Alleys, among the bugs we fixed was removing the exploit where survivors could get on to a roof near the drop down to the river, we rebalanced item distribution, switched out the L4D2 mounted gun for the L4D1 mini-gun, and more.

Some examples from Cold Stream: South Pine Stream; we removed the shortcut through the bushes between a pair of barricades leading to the barrel explosion event, added a tool tip to prompt players to fight to the safe room when the onslaught begins, blocked the ability to get under the map, and more.

We will have detailed release notes for each update as they are released.

February 17, 2011

Sorry for the recent lack of updates, we have been working on a surprise and here it is.

Matthew Lourdelet (2 Evil Eyes) has been working on a new community campaign – Cold Stream. We loved 2 Evil Eyes and Cold Stream looks even more promising with innovative game play arenas and effects. Matthew has really shown that there are still plenty of new ideas in L4D2 modding.

He recently shared it with us and we love it so far but it isn’t done. We were tempted to have him quietly finish it with our help and release it as part of an upcoming DLC.

Tempted… but we decided against that. Instead, we think we have a better idea. We want you the community to be part of the process of taking his unfinished campaign and releasing it as DLC on the Xbox 360, PC and Mac.

Since Matthew already has a start on the campaign, we need to back up a little in the process before we go forward.

The very first step in creating a new DLC is deciding on the larger goals and constraints for the DLC. The Sacrifice and the Passing were story heavy, so we want to see what the other end of the spectrum looks like. For this DLC we start with wanting to experiment by releasing a map pack that wasn’t about story. It would just be new campaigns for Left 4 Dead 2.

That makes the first constraint no new audio or story.

The easiest starting point for new campaigns is the three remaining Left 4 Dead 1 campaigns, so the DLC will include those. We also want something brand new and Cold Stream is the perfect fit.

That’s the start of the DLC. We have the basic information but we don’t even have a name or release date yet.

We will hold off on the name for now.

That leaves the release date. The answer to when the DLC will be released is simple for now, sometime after Portal 2. Why don’t we set some date in stone right now? Because the real answer to when we are going to release something is always – when it’s ready.

Quality is a function of time and resources. So we can throw more people at the problem and/or take longer. We like to not constrain ourselves by either, so at this point we are willing to say – “Let’s not set a date yet, we’ll know better later.” Of course, that is also why the concept of Valve Time exists but later you will see why “Valve Time” is a good thing, not a bad thing.

For now, that’s it.

In the next few weeks we will add Cold Stream to the UI (user interface) and we will all begin testing it. As we receive feedback and test data we will also share some data we collect on player experience and show how we put that data to use. We will include you with regular posts, polls, and updates.

We have created a special forum just for feedback on the campaign and this project (Cold Stream Forum). While the beta will only be available for PC and Mac users, we appreciate feedback and ideas from the entire community. This is an experiment for us, so please let us know what you think and what you would like to see in the DLC – just remember the constraints.